The past few days were not overly kind to the Bitcoin markets. Although no major corrections have occurred, the Bitcoin price has been remarkably flat for quite some time now. That has all come to change over the past 24 hours, as the BTC price has suddenly started moving up again. Thanks to solid gains, we are now looking at a value of just over US$18,000. Maintaining this momentum may not be possible for more than a few hours, though.

Bitcoin price is Finally Moving up Again

On paper, it was only a matter of time until we saw some more Bitcoin price movement. While the year 2017 has been permabullish much of the time, things suddenly came to an uncomfortable standstill a week and a half ago. We have seen very little momentum ever since, although maintaining a value of nearly US$15,500 is pretty impressive in its own right. Then again, it was only to be expected that the massive run would need some time to regain its momentum again.

Over the past 24 hours, we have seen the Bitcoin price rise from US$16,314 all the way to US$17,997. That is a remarkable gain, to say the very least. After all, after such a prolonged period of sideways trading, this price action is not what most people expected. Plenty of traders and speculators have been waiting for a Bitcoin bounce, and it will be interesting to see if this momentum can be maintained.

It seems we may see a slight Bitcoin price retracement in the coming hours. Its 8% 24-hour gain suggests there will be plenty of profit-taking in the very near future. Although a small dip will not necessarily mean much, there is no reason to think this Bitcoin price will remain even remotely stable at this price level. It is unfortunate we can’t have any real stability in the cryptocurrency markets, but we’ll all have to endure it for now.

With over US$15.7 billion in 24-hour trading volume, Bitcoin is shattering all previous records once again. It is uncanny how this volume seems to spike out of nowhere on a regular basis, even as most other cryptocurrencies are struggling for any decent volume numbers right now. An 11-digit trading volume is almost the new normal as far as Bitcoin is concerned, which is a welcome change of pace from earlier in 2017. The market capitalization of the world’s leading cryptocurrency has also surpassed US$300 billion again, which is good to see.

Unsurprisingly, Bitfinex is still the leading cryptocurrency exchange in terms of 24-hour trading volume. Its lead over Bithumb is just US$130 million, though, which is next to nothing. Poloniex and Bittrex are also contributing a lot of volume, although it is through their XRP/BTC trading markets. bitFlyer has slipped all the way down to the tenth position, which is mainly due to altcoin and USD pairs on other exchanges showing such strong volume over the past 24 hours.

How all of this will play out for Bitcoin remains to be seen. Plenty of people expect the Bitcoin price to hit US$20,00 before the year is over, but that may not be feasible. There is still a very long way to go before that price level can be reached, and there is no reason to get ahead of ourselves.